O! I care not that my earthly lot
      Hath little of Earth in it,
That years of love have been forgot
      In the fever of a minute:

I heed not that the desolate
      Are happier, sweet, than I,
But that you meddle with my fate
      Who am a passerby.

It is not that my founts of bliss
      Are gushing -- strange! with tears --
Or that the thrill of a single kiss
      Hath palsied many years --

'Tis not that the flowers of twenty springs
      Which have wither'd as they rose
Lie dead on my heart-strings
      With the weight of an age of snows.

Not that the grass -- O! may it thrive!
      On my grave is growing or grown-
But that, while I am dead yet alive
      I cannot be, lady, alone.